1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ATM communication system which constitutes an ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) network system.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the conventional packet communication system, a packet has a comparatively longer length and is also variable, and transmission/exchange operations have been conducted based on software. Therefore, such packet communication system cannot realize a high speed and wide band communication exceeding 150 Mbps.
Meanwhile, a system for transferring information per unit of a packet (hereinafter referred to as a "cell") having a fixed length is called an ATM system, which can process speech, video and data signals in the same manner and perform the switching by hardware based on header information defined within the cells, to enable high speed and wide band transmission and switching of information with a large expectation for a future communication system.
However, such an ATM system has a problem that if it is attempted to store, for making reference, the information of all ATM terminals on the ATM communication network into only one ATM terminal by storing real memory information of the other ATM terminals on a real memory of an ATM terminal on the ATM communication network, it cannot be sure that all ATM terminals have in common the same information due to a delay of ATM cell transmission.